


All roads lead to Rome

by Beginte



Series: Work and Play [13]
Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Some feels, spies purchasing a summer house
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-19
Updated: 2016-11-19
Packaged: 2018-08-31 23:18:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8597692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beginte/pseuds/Beginte
Summary: “Your photography skills leave a lot to be desired,” Q says snootily, but it’s soft and does nothing to hide the warm, pleasant surprise caught in between his words. “But it does look pleasant. Trust you to find a rather perfect house for bloody sale mid-mission. It is for sale, isn’t it?”

-
In which they buy a summer house in Italy.





	

* * *

They buy a summer house in Italy.

It was by no means as quick and simple as that - they’d been half-attentively discussing it for weeks; short, not entirely serious conversations in between missions, screaming over gunfire on the comms, enjoying the always excellent reunion sex, eating take-out in front of telly, and talking about a hundred other, small, more important things.

Still, somewhere along the way the idea had turned into an intent, which then turned into a not entirely graceful or well-maintained plan. They’d discussed and ruled out several countries (some were too far to sensibly access by anything other than lengthy plane flights, and in some others Mr Bond was no longer welcome by the local authorities). Eventually, they’d settled on Italy. Spain and Croatia contended the longest, but were eventually chucked aside.

Currently, they’ve settled on the central or southern region of the country (they both want a warm climate), and are sporadically thinking about more specific locations. Their requirements are fairly general. Q wants warmth, open space (albeit with internet connection or at least the possibility of creating it), closeness of sea, and a fast train to Rome and its art galleries and ancient monuments. Bond wants plenty of sun, seclusion, Mediterranean cuisine, and a swimming pool on the property.

Between their combined paycheques (which they hardly every utilise, seeing as they’re both almost entirely consumed by work) money is almost literally no object, so they take their time.

* * *

 Bond has just killed a man near Grosseto and is making his way through endless, sun-kissed fields and vineyards, the greenery lush around him in the early days of a Tuscan June. He’s been walking for over an hour when he spots it.

A house, not too big but not small either, on a patch of nicely located land. He steers himself closer towards it, eyes scanning the building quickly and efficiently as he comes nearer: the house is of a mixed age, the oldest part of it probably well over a hundred years old while the two attachments look to be in their forties or fifties at most. It’s a charming, Italian countryside style, with old, sunburnt shingles on the roof, and just a touch run down, just enough to give it some pleasant character and a promise of some light tinkering to be done.

The land is just the right size, with a mixture of grass and wild flowers, a patch of lavender sprawling on one side in clear view of some of the windows. There’s ample space for a swimming pool, Bond’s mind eagerly supplies, and Christ, he would kill for a dip in cool water right now. There is no other house in sight, the terrain is beautiful, and the location is perfect.

And there, just a few metres ahead, because Bond is a lucky, lucky bastard (as Q sometimes furiously growls at him, right before snogging the living daylights out of him), is an old man just attaching a ‘for sale’ sign to a piece of shoddy wooden fence.

Putting on a pleasant, gently interested smile, Bond approaches him, scuffing his shoes on the dirt road to announce his presence. The man turns, his weathered face first intrigued and then somewhat alarmed, and Bond relaxes his stance to make up for the bloodstains on his shirt. It would be an awful shame to put off this nice man just when a prospect is looming on Bond’s horizon.

“How much do you want for this?” he asks in Italian.

They talk for a while, Bond managing well enough to grasp the man’s mostly-dialect Italian. He gets a small tour of the premises. There is an old well, though the house has fully functional modern plumbing, he’s promptly assured. The grass and flowers are pleasant, the house located on a small hill offering a nice view of vineyards stretching ahead. There are three handsome, well-grown walnut trees about twenty or so metres beside the house.

Q loves fresh walnuts. He hates them dried, they’re too bitter for him, and the fresh ones are a treat that only lasts between September and October. He scours all sorts of health and organic food markets for them, buying them at horrendous (even by Bond’s standards) prices and just peeling out of their green husks.

Half an hour and a refreshing drink (and some personal charm) later Bond jots down the owner’s number and promises to get back to him within days. He snaps a photo of the house with his phone and sends it to Q without a word.

* * *

 “ _How am I supposed to interpret this?_ ” Q rings him precisely twelve minutes later, when Bond is making his way towards the nearest train station, and he’s aware of wearing what Q calls a shit-eating grin.

“I think I’ve found our summer home,” he says innocently.

A beat.

“ _Are you serious? Oh Christ, tell me you haven’t already paid for it._ ”

“I would never, not without consulting you first, my darling.”

“ _Bond_ ,” Q growls, but he’s fond under it. Bond can tell he’s looking at the photo, probably pulled up on one of his screens.

“Do you like it?” he asks, completely sincerely as he hops over a short fence and walks on through grass towards the small train station already in sight.

Another beat.

“ _Your photography skills leave a lot to be desired_ ,” Q says snootily, but it’s soft and does nothing to hide the warm, pleasant surprise caught in between his words. “ _But it does look pleasant. Trust you to find a rather perfect house_ for bloody sale _mid-mission. It is for sale, isn’t it?”_

“It is. The current owner is a very nice elderly man who wants to retire in Florence. He just sold his vineyards to his neighbour and is now hoping to sell the house and the bit of land around it to some rich naive city-dwellers like ourselves.”

Bond knows that Q has so far been not entirely convinced about this idea. Or rather, about the reality of it. He enjoys talking to Bond about it every now and then or looking at pictures online when a whim strikes them, indulging Bond when he brings up the subject over breakfast. But now that he’s suddenly faced with it, once again on a whim, but so much more palpable and real than before, he hedges, uncertain for a beat. Bond bites his lip and waits, giving him time. Q doesn’t take well to being pushed.

“ _It really does look nice_ ,” his voice is quieter, much softer when he speaks again, and it warms Bond’s heart in a way he’s not even embarrassed by. “ _But James, this is idiotic. We’d only be there what, two, three times a year?”_

“I think we easily can make it more. Think of it as a way for me to convince you taking time off work is actually a good thing and England won’t collapse without you in Q-Branch.”

“ _James...”_

“There are three walnut trees on the property,” he deals the blow.

“ _Oh_...”

“We could have a hammock right between two of them,” he’s merciless, he knows, and he enjoys showering Q with such lovely images. And he enjoys picturing Q happy, stretched out lazily in said hammock, rocking in miniscule swings in the warm afternoon light. So relaxed and kissable and safely away from stress. Bond feels a warmth that comes from inside him and has nothing to do with the day’s temperature. “Plenty of room for a swimming pool. And there’s a train station not far. Direct connection to Rome, probably.”

“ _You sound awfully sure.”_

_“_ All roads lead to Rome, love.”

“ _James...”_

_“_ Just think of Bernini. And fresh walnuts. I’ll be home in a few hours.”

“ _Alright_.”

* * *

 They do buy the house, in the end. Once fed Bond’s homemade lasagne (his own recipe, tweaked here and there from the original given to him by an old lady in Sicily over ten years ago) and snuggled on the sofa, Q is quite malleable and much more easily persuaded than he normally is. His spine of steel relaxes significantly, and after two more days of looking at pictures and Bond rumbling softly in his ear about Italian sunlight, mini breaks and walnuts, Q relents quite helplessly.

Bond makes a mental note to revisit this strategy in the future, when coaxing Q into getting a dog. (Or two.)

The owner is delighted when Bond gets back to him. It’s an early Saturday afternoon, because it’s Q’s day off on Saturdays; Bond is sprawled on the sofa in just his underwear, a notebook and pen in his lap to make notes of necessary details, and Q watches him from the sofa’s other end, smiling because he understands Bond’s perfectly schooled, textbook Italian. All the details and the price agreed on, they settle a date for a meeting with a local notary and end the conversation.

“This is ridiculous,” Q says after a beat of sun-filled silence. He’s smiling, but Bond still perks up attentively, watching Q’s face for any cues of discomfort.

“It is,” he admits. “But I rather think we deserve it, don’t you?” he says, running a hand over Q’s foot before giving it a squeeze and massaging it a little.

“Mmm,” Q says, neither here nor there. Despite the abundance of relaxation filling their flat along with sweet summer air, Bond’s heartbeat picks up with a small note of worry.

Very carefully, he runs a hand up Q’s shin and looks at him, quiet, gathering his thoughts. He’s not quite sure which words should go with what’s in his head, and he’d like to choose them carefully. To Bond, the house is a whim as much as it is to Q - it is ridiculous, but also lovely and framed in pleasant possibilities of getaways and idleness and simply indulgence. Bond is a hedonist, and so is Q, really, deep down - even being Quartermaster is a pursuit of pleasure.

But that’s just one side of things. The other, smaller, but nevertheless present, is that the house is also about the future. It’s a form of a long-term idea and something that extends beyond their existence as 007 and the Quartermaster. Naturally, their lives already extend plenty beyond that - their home life is about being James and Q and spending time talking, watching telly, reading, squabbling about a thousand things, shagging, taking walks, or just existing together, in their home or outside of it. And so much more.

He’s made up his mind quite a while ago. He wants to spend the rest of his life with Q. He wants to actually fucking _retire_ someday, life and limbs intact, and have the rest of his life all to himself and Q. And yes, he could very well do all that without a summer house, and a summer house in Italy, of all places. He doesn’t _need_ it. It’s symbolic, in a way. It’s not a way that matters _a lot_ \- Bond values his relationship with Q much more than to measure it by such things - but it would simply be _nice_. And Bond wants that.

And he isn’t quite sure how to say all that.

“I would like very much to buy that house with you,” he says softly, perhaps too softly, because Q’s eyes snap to him instantly, inquisitive and concerned. “It’s fine if you don’t want to do it. But I thought it would be... nice. For now and... for later.”

Q looks at him, eyes so luminous and so green behind his glasses, dark hair tickling his eyebrows, and Bond loves him so terribly.

“I’d like that very much too,” Q says, smiling. “It’s still ridiculous. And I still want it.”

Bond grins and then, without a hint of warning, pounces on him, pen and notebook flying, Q squeaking when Bond traps him under his body and kisses him breathless.

* * *

Q takes the next Friday off (he’s got about thirty days of unused leave banked up and Bond knows Mallory sometimes dreads the idea that Q might decide to use them all at once) and they take a two-day trip. Q falls in love with the house on sight and looks delighted with the buds of walnuts-to-be apparent on the trees he was promised. They meet with the owner and the notary and sign all the necessary paperwork and make the payment in full.

A tour about the house delights Q to no end. He’s excited, smiling, eyes shining as he explores the rooms and the outside, nattering excitedly about internet connections and tinkering, but also about the light and the warmth and the views. The owner tells them that in late October the vineyards all turn flaming red and orange and go on for miles. Q looks absolutely enraptured.

They sleep in a motel in the village, and Q is alight with both ease and excitement. Bond runs his hands through Q’s hair, up and down his back, listening and talking as they lie in bed, legs tangled together.

“I’m glad we’ve done it,” Q says, breathless and flushed with happiness. “It’ll be lovely. Lots of small things to repair,” because Q loves to tinker, and so does Bond, really, when it comes to tinkering of the household sort - he’s just never had an actual household, until moving in with Q and putting up a new bookcase Q’s been too tired, too busy and too lazy to take care of. “Did you pick a spot for the swimming pool?”

“We’ll pick it together,” Bond says courteously, though he does have a definite favourite and will fight Q on it if need be.

On August bank holiday they make a four-day weekend of it and spend it in their new summer house. They shop for furniture (since the ex-owner took almost all of it with him to Florence) and christen their choice for the bedroom by shagging on the mattress they’d bought earlier that day in the town. It’s the only thing in the otherwise bare room, laid out in the middle, and later, sweaty and snuggled up together, they look out the window at the stars clearly visible in the night sky. Q makes a sound of longing and says he’ll finally have a proper reason to buy a telescope. Bond kisses him until they both fall asleep.

Bit by bit, their summer house gets reorganised and rearranged - one or two bigger changes done to the rooms are carried out by hired workers (minded by a helpful neighbour), but the rest Bond and Q do themselves. Bond finds a peaceful rhythm in this sort of manual labour, and Q’s always had a proclivity for tinkering. Q doesn’t put up much of a fight about the spot for the swimming pool (far too busy being disturbingly enthusiastic about installing a security system of his own design), and Bond is content to get his way about that.

Coaxed, Q takes a few more days off here and there, leaving R to run Q-Branch (and always available via mobile and computer in case of emergencies), and by December their summer house is fully habitable, albeit somewhat empty. That’s alright - they’ve got years and years of lazy, peaceful summer escapades to add things to it. And they don’t need much for their brief getaways anyway. They bring books from every escapade to Grosseto or the village nearby; they both read in Italian, though Q sometimes needs to consult a dictionary, so they buy that too, despite the internet. Their flat is full of books, both of them collecting them almost absentmindedly, so it seems only natural that books slowly trickle into their summer house too.

When spring comes, they take a five-day mini break and spend it getting an early tan, lazing in their garden and visiting the village. They take strolls, Bond for once meandering narrow streets of a foreign city armed only with the camera Q had got and customised for him – the first birthday present Bond had got from him. This year, Bond had surprised Q on his birthday with a telescope. He’d spent a lot of time searching for the best and consulting R on several occasions, because much like Q she too is an avid ‘space nerd’, as she puts it. At night, they set up the telescope and look at the stars, the skies clear over the miles and miles of vineyards.

Bond pulls Q closer and kisses him, noses a little chilled in the spring night, and decides they’ll buy that hammock next.

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> Another thing I was supposed to do for the 007 Fest but didn't finish it in time. I really like this fic, hope you enjoyed reading it :)


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